Fishing and Fun on Clark's Pond

In the mid-1880s, the bass fishing suddenly improved in French Creek especially around Clark’s Pond. Two or three years later the secret behind the improvement leaked out.A cousin of Perry Stranahan who was connected with the U.S. Fisheries told Perry that he was on the P 7 E train which was traveling through Union City with a large shipment of small bass. The fish weren’t enduring the trip too well and began to die. The P & E conductor stopped the train on a bridge on the upper part of Clark’s Pond and dumped the entire shipment of fish into the pond. Up until this time very few bass could be found in French Creek, but now it suddenly boiled with them.Brook trout were also quite plentiful in Upper French Creek in the 1890s. Lyle Showers saw several caught just above the Main Street Bridge in Union City. In the spring-time of the early 1890s, sucker fishermen were busy and a good hole was still located at the railroad bridge of the P & E west of Main Street. At least twenty to thirty fishermen at once were pulling in suckers, but only black ones. Buffalo or white suckers in Big French Creek at LeBoeuf never seemed to swim up French Creek as far as Union City.Clark’s Pond also supplied power for Clark’s large five story grist mill and for Clark’s Saw Planing and Stave Mill on the corner of Willow and Bridge Streets. The race was located under Bridge Street at the mouth of the creek.People fished, skated and swam on Clark’s Pond and union City’s only steamer, The lone Star, docked at the southeast end of Bridge Street.